Anna Kendrick Adorably Visualizes Herself As A Hardcore Rapper And Waxes Poetic About Her Dirty Love For Taco Bell

I know that we have a lot of girl crushes here — really, can you have too many? — but Anna Kendrick hits a spot between adorable and badass. It started when she played the innocent girl who sabotaged her bunkmate in the indie “theater kids” dramedy Camp; in the Twilight movies, her character always had a comeback to Bella’s moping; and now in Pitch Perfect, she’s the edgy kid who teaches her a capella group how to incorporate raps and mash-ups into their stiff old routine.

You get the same sense of that personality in Anna herself, especially when she appeared on Conan last night. She and Conan O’Brien riffed really well when talking about her other new release, End of Watch with Jake Gyllenhaal. We’d already heard the story about Jake and his co-stars getting tased as part of their Method acting/police training, but hearing Anna tell the story, and her shocked reactions, is so great. The way she squeals and laughs about it is really unguarded and genuine. Plus, Conan playing up the “really intense” clip from End of Watch made the punchline at the end of the first video really funny.

I really don’t know if that’s supposed to be an outtake or an unexpectedly funny part of the movie. But of course the image of Anna in a wedding dress throwing gang signs had the conversation transitioning over to her rap in Pitch Perfect. Even though Anna is Broadway trained so she could shine in the singing scenes, she had to play a character who’s not comfortable with singing in public. In the “Riff-Off” clip that’s been going around online, she bursts into the middle of an a capella battle with Dr. Dre‘s rap from “No Diggity.”

What I found incredibly fascinating, that Anna explained, is how in actually rapping for the cameras she had to act all embarrassed and bad at rapping. But when it came time for her to record the soundtrack, the producers wanted her to actually sell it: “So, like, I had to put myself in this zone where I was standing like a guy and imagining I had a penis and in a hot tub surrounded by bitches… I went home, and my friends were like, ‘Oh no, were you doing the hand motions?’ and I was like, ‘I created a whole scenario and backstory! There were imaginary extras in this story, and I was degrading them, and it was awful!’”

Sadly, she wouldn’t rap for Conan. But we’re willing to forgive her because of the Taco Bell anecdote that also comes up. Just watch the video already!